All about MEEEEE!

Passages from various stories I've written, all of which made me wonder where they came from after they were written:

You can find them all (except the last snippet) in stories published on FF.net

Snippet 1 (from a chapter that's now somewhat bittersweet the way it wasn't last week)

Giles holds his glass aloft, watches the light through the liquid, and tries desperately to stop the thoughts chasing each other in circles inside his head. This is a momentous occasion, a voice inside his mind remarks. Something needs to be said.

In response, Giles straightens in his chair, holds the glass up in a toast, and says to no one in particular, “To the late Alexander Harris, murdered in the name of hope and love, age 22, in the month of May in the Year of Our Lord 2002 on a beautiful sunny day on Kingman’s Bluff. You are sorely missed.”

With that, Giles downs the contents of his glass. Then he pours himself another.

Snippet 2

Hey, Xan? Ever regret something you said?

How did I know you'd say, 'Everything that ever came out of my mouth?' C'mon, I'm being serious here.

Yeah, I guess that regret of mine is weighing heavy on my mind.

You know the funny thing? The really funny thing? I didn't even realize I had this regret until recently, y'know? I think I realized it last night. That’s when it hit me like, whack, right upside the head.

I dunno. I guess I’m doing what everyone else is doing, you know, trying to figure out where I go from here.

So, I’m coming home from patrol last night and I get to thinking about fate, destiny, and all that other stuff that seems to attract itself to Slayers. Well, here I am, poster child for ADD that I am, and suddenly I start flashing on everything that happened since I got the Call. Anyway, I’m going through my mental photo album and then I come across this one scene, this one little scene, and I just stop right there. I keep replaying this scene over and over in my head. Then I get to thinking how your whole life can change in a heartbeat because of something that’s said or something that’s left unsaid.

Two words, Xan. Two stupid words. I would trade almost everything to take them back.

Snippet 3

Sometimes he thinks there’s someone missing, a person who resides just at the edge of his memory. Sometimes he turns to look at the backseat to say something to someone who isn’t there. Sometimes he can see a flash of gold and a California smile lurking in the shadows.

Sometimes he even remembers a name.

Sometimes he sees her turning to talk to someone who isn’t there and he knows she’s looking for the same ghost he’s looking for.

But it’s just the two of them, and always has been since they started driving. They never fight. Oh, they argue, they disagree, they debate, but at the core is that solid bedrock of love and friendship that links the two of them together in comfortable companionship. Him and her. Her and him. They are two against the world trying to find a place in the world.

Except the world doesn’t seem to want them.

Sometimes he thinks he’s going crazy. Sometimes he thinks that he’s completely sane. Sometimes he’s not sure which of these options scare him more.

Buffy watched this exchange through wondering eyes. Clueless Xander was simply being Xander, chatting up the waitress he’d come to know and like. Dolly? Well, she seemed to express a certain fondness for a client that somehow became a friend. Buffy wasn’t sure, but she was willing to bet that Cinderella was going to get a run for her money in the favorite client category.

Dolly stopped fiddling with her apron, took two steps up to Xander and lightly brushed her lips against his cheek in a sweet kiss.

Xander blinked in surprise as he regarded Dolly. “What was that for?” he asked.

It’s not giving anything away by saying that Xander and his descendents never saw her or her like again.

“What just happened?” Xander asked.

“Xander, I think you better sit down,” Buffy quietly said.

“Why?”

Buffy thought a moment. “I have a fairytale that I have to tell you, but I think it’ll take awhile.”

Xander dropped into the chair Dolly vacated. “Oh?”

“I think you’ll like this one because I think it ends with happily ever after, well, maybe not happily, but happier ever after.”

“Okay,” Xander slowly said, uncertain about what would next come out of Buffy’s mouth. He had a feeling that his day was going to get even stranger.

A warm happy smile began to form on Buffy’s face. She wanted to laugh. She wanted to shout. She wanted to throw her arms around Xander in a bone-crushing hug and tell him that fairytales were real and that fairy godmothers come in the most surprising packages.

That sometimes the blood and pain between the beginning and the end of the story really is worth the heartache.

Snippet 5

He opened the manila folder and stared at the Wolfram & Hart letterhead. The sticky note bore a message from Deadboy himself offering his condolences about Anya’s death.

Now there was a perfect snapshot of where his life now stood. The only person outside of Andrew who had expressed any sympathy for Anya’s death was a souled vampire whom he didn’t like and had every reason to dislike him.

Xander wished he had the energy to hate Angel for being so fucking noble, but instead he found he was pathetically grateful for this one small attempt at common decency. He gently rubbed a fingertip over the yellow slip of paper as if he could absorb some of that decency into himself because, if he were being honest, he felt dirty.

Snippet 6 (a story that's really bittersweet in a way that it wasn't last week)

I am slime. You can slug me up now, God. Right here. Just make sure when you slug me up that you do it near an overturned saltshaker. Got it?

The slug wish is if you decide not to come through with the time travel wish. Just so we’re clear.

Snippet 7

Mars’s passing probably means nothing in the grand scheme of things, but he can’t help but think there’s something appropriate about the fact that Mars chose this very year to borrow a cup of sugar before going on its merry way for another 285 years.

It almost makes him wonder if there’s something intelligent out there in the big old universe that suffers under the delusion that it’s got a sense of humor, or at least a sense of finely tuned irony.

Frankly, he feels like he’s been brained by a falling anvil, so he’s not willing to give God, a Universal Intelligence, or some other Cosmic Clockmaker points for subtlety. And as for humor, he’ll take the late, great Bill Hicks any day of the week: “Does that trouble anyone here? The idea that God might be fuckin’ with our heads?”

Mr. Hicks? Consider me troubled, and my head well and truly fucked.

Snippet 8

Xander was pretty certain that Andrew’s next step was to draw up canonization papers for Anya. If that happened, Xander planned cheerfully direct Andrew to the closest Catholic list of saints and show him the entry for St. Anyanka, Patron Saint of Scorned Women, complete with Medieval portraits of the once and future icon.

St. Anyanka pray for us, St. Anyanka aid us, St. Anyanka avenge us, St. Anyanka comfort us. Our hearts call out to you, our tears cry out for you. Your sword is our innocence, your words our weapon. Shed the blood of mine enemies and protect me from their shadows. Such is my wish and will. Amen.

The words of the ancient prayer had sprung unbidden in his mind. If Xander were even capable of feeling any emotion other than raw pain, he might’ve been surprised that this particular prayer, out of the several that he’d found, seemed intent on weaving its way through his thoughts since his arrival in Oxnard.

Anya had no idea that he’d done some research on her former life as both demon and saint early on in their dating game. Frankly, he’d thought mentioning that little fact to her would’ve probably been a mistake, since it might’ve made her misty for the good old days of blood and gore. Although, in retrospect, maybe Anya would’ve been ecstatic that he showed an interest.

As it was, he managed to recall the prayer once a day since he washed up in Oxnard, leading him to wonder if he was somehow praying to Anya, Anyanka, or whomever she was when she died. That left some disturbing questions. Save him from whom? And avenge what? And just who deserved to die here? Because from an objective point of view, he was exactly the kind of guy St. Anyanka would’ve loved to tear apart with her bare hands and teeth, complete with a Xena-like war cry.

Snippet 9

Xander could see the fleeting hungry looks on the two men’s faces. They were clearly salivating for whatever news the waitress had overheard in the diner. He felt a kick under the table and looked at Faith. Her eyes crinkled with amusement through the smoke as she puckered her lips to give him an air kiss.

“Look, strange ain’t it how he was all hurtin’ a little over a year ago. Had to let go all the day workers and the bank even started to foreclose,” the waitress settled in like a goose on her golden eggs of information. “Six months later, he’s flush and flash and payin’ off the bank in full.”

“Said his uncle in Chicago died,” Business Man said with amusement.

“Yeah, where was ya, April? You remember the big story,” Bitter Man said with the air of someone who didn’t buy it either.

“Hey, I lived in this town all my life…” the waitress began.

Faith mouthed the word “sad” at Xander.

“…and I’m tellin’ ya, he ain’t never had no uncle in Chicago ’fore last year,” the waitress insisted. “If he did he’da been long gone. He hates this town. Always did. My sister was in his class in high school and he was always goin’ on and on ’bout how he was gonna wipe the dust from this here town an’ not look back.”

Xander looked down at his empty breakfast plate. That was one sentiment that sounded just a little too familiar. He wondered what happened to keep ol’ Talnin tied to the homestead since one ugly stint as a stripper in Oxnard was probably not the reason their suspected zombie master stuck around.

“Shouldda kept his hand wrapped around his dick instead of stickin’ it in Jules, then,” Bitter Man commented.

Faith rolled her eyes as Xander tried not to laugh. Question asked and crudely answered.

Snippet 10 (call this a preview)

During one such pause, the last one before they hit the bottom in fact, Faith found the nerve to ask the question that had been nagging her since Willow cast her spell. “Hey, X-man,” she said quietly.

There was a pause before the whispered, “Yeah?”

“You and Willow. You guys are good buds, right?”

“Yeah.” The whisper revealed both a question and a suspicion.

“So that’s probably why you don’t freak like everyone else when she struts her witchy stuff.”

There was an uncomfortable shifting behind her accompanied by the sounds of weapons being adjusted, although she wasn’t sure if it was Xander reacting to what she said or because he was trying to regain his sense of equilibrium.

“I mean,” Faith tried to explain, “she’s got a lot of power and that shit can be scary shit.”

“Because she could wipe us all out with one word.”

A shiver went down Faith’s spine at the whispered acknowledgement that Xander knew, probably better than anyone else, what exactly Willow was capable of doing in bad circumstances. Shit. If Xander could say it…she’d heard vague stories about Willow doing some dark deeds with that power, but she didn’t want to think too much about it because that would be too much like looking in a mirror.

“Yeah,” she whispered back. “Something like that.”

There was another pause before she felt Xander’s chin resting on her shoulder, warm breath close, lips practically brushing her right ear, “Faith? Every single person in our happy little Slayer cult is capable of cold-blooded murder. All of us. Buffy. Robin. Giles. Andrew. Willow. You. Even me.”

Faith swallowed and stared straight ahead and tried not to think about the point Xander was trying to make.

“I learned that lesson the hard way, so I make sure never to forget,” Xander added quietly. “And neither should you.”